Winds Of Change - Paroma Bhattacharya(Dedicated to my paternal grandfather) (story read aloud TXT) 📗

It was always a majestic sight that would greet your eyes as you approached Mount Carmel High School for girls. The twin peaks of the main building which were visible from afar were named Eve and K2 by the students, drawing comparison with the peaks of Mount Everest and Mount K2 respectively. Mr. & Mrs Roy dropped Lona off at the gate where the security was taking their names and roll nos. Lona searched for the names of her friends and soon rejoiced as she caught sight of both of them making their way to help her with her luggage.
It was the beginning of ninth grade for Swati , Shweta and Lona. They were sitting in their dorm and chatting as the matron came up to them and checked if everything was hunky dory with them.
“Unpack and arrange your part of the dorm and please keep everything clean” shouted the matron to all of them.
The dorm was a big room with 12 bunk beds. Each girl was assigned her own bed, top or bottom as was the case, by the matron as they poured into the room, on a strictly first come first service basis. Lona unfortunately being late was given a bed on the far corner away from Swati and Shweta. She got her favorite top spot though, and thanked god for this small mercy. All the girls were quickly settling in and could be heard talking to each other excitedly. Lona’s bunk partner was Pooja who occupied the bottom bed. Pooja was the class monitor and a very bossy kind of girl and Lona hated her for being the schools heartthrob inspite of her wrongdoings.
The next day school started and everyone dressed up in their uniforms, took their seats in the classroom. They all had expressions of expectations on their faces as they were waiting to find out who their class teacher would be. The class was divided in their expectations as some wanted class teachers’ from science background and some wanted from Arts. Finally the bell rang and Mrs Priti Singh made her way into the room. Everyone stood up to greet her with a resounding Good Morning.
Mrs. Priti Singh was a favorite among the parents and a terror for the students because of her strict adherence to rules and regulations. Not just that she demanded absolute alertness and attention from the students. Also she was known to ask the most baffling questions at the end of the class and anyone who failed to answer her suitably would immediately be in her bad books.
She started to take the attendance and reached Lona’s name. Shweta shook her knee to awake her from her daydreaming but unfortunately it did not go unseen from the piercing eyes of Mrs Singh.
“ Lona, stand up and give me your notebook, I want to see whether you have done your homework or not?” shouted Mrs Singh.
“yes Ma’aaam” stammered Lona.
Lona went to the platform for the teachers and climbed it to show her the work.
“ The method used to solve it is wrong”, Its not the one that I taught, so I will give u no marks for it. Try to be alert in class and solve the problems yourself instead of copying from others” retorted Mrs Roy.
“ But my answers are correct and the method was taught by my father, I couldn’t understand how to solve it by the method u taught.” Cried Lona
“ Well your father is not here right now is he?, so how will u solve the other problems”, U have to understand the concept and then work hard at the solution. My method is the simplest, Pooja please can you help her out”, shouted Mrs Singh.
Lona was feeling terrible. Now the whole evening Pooja will be bludgeoning her to solve the problems till she was satisfied Lona had understood the problem and could solve it on her own. Mathematics was an interesting subject to Lona but she would make real silly mistakes like while writing 6 becomes 0 and then the whole thing would fall apart. Conceptually Lona had got the the hang of Mathematics but because of her non- textbook answers, she would get less marks.
Next was English teacher’s turn to make an impact. She was a beautiful woman and her sarees were always pastel colored and very soothing to the eyes. The students were always glued to her as she spoke and explained the characters of the story she was teaching.
“Open your wren and Martin to page 379, I will be teaching you question tags, short answers etc today” told Mrs sen to the students.
Lona tried to to cover her laugh and whispered to shweta, “ Are we dogs that we are being taught how to use tags.”
“ Shut up Lona, Ma’am is looking” retorted shweta.
Lona quickly opened to the page before Mrs Sen called her to do the reading but unfortunately she failed to impress upon Mrs Sen.
“Ok today Lona will be doing the reading with me” cried out Mrs Sen
Lona Stood up and gave a wry smile before starting to read. oh Boy she thought, first day itself got into so much of trouble, God help me out here!.
After classes which ended at 2pm they hurried to have their lunch in the canteen. They were now seniors but the 10 grade girls made their way towards them in the canteen.
“ Its time for ragging” said the huge looking female Namrata.
“ No one will eat more than 1 roti and that too only with 1 onion” said her friend asin
“ After that each one will be assigned to washing a 10th grader’s clothes, Pooja you are to see that no one does otherwise, continued Asin.
Life was becoming tough for the girls. One girl started crying and was consoled by her friends. Pooja monitored the girls so that none were eating more than they should. They all started missing home especially Lona, Shweta & Lona were talking to each other deciding that just for the day they wont inform this to the officials who had banned ragging long back. They decided they will revolt if it continues tomorrow as well.
The evening was beautiful with the sun and the mist converging at a point and making it a heavenly abode. The girls were in the badminton court which had lights so it was still possible to play, even in the twilight. Lona was good with